致母亲节！女总裁：“我要向所有共事过的职场妈妈道歉”

    在一个非常杰出的团队的帮助下（其中有50%是来自世界各地的母亲），我和同样身为人母的米利娜正在搭建PowerToFly平台。目前五大洲的女性通过该平台获得的薪酬已经超过100万美元，而且这个数字还在快速增长。我们听说的一些故事非常令人振奋。

    在公司成立前，我们的技术总监内达每周都要从保加利亚的家里飞往伦敦工作。内达的女儿由于想和母亲每天待在一起，甚至曾经在周日晚上藏进了内达的行李箱里。现在内达终于可以每天到幼儿园接女儿回家了。另外，内达每周往返伦敦需要10小时的通勤（这还不包括搭乘伦敦地铁的时间），而她现在每天下午只需步行30分钟就能接到她的女儿。

    我希望在五年前，作为一名还没有孩子的经理，我就能够明白一个道理：一个团队是需要已经成为母亲的女性的。有句话说得好：“如果你想干成一件事，就让一个忙碌的人去办。”这就是我现在为什么喜欢和母亲们一起工作。

    已为人母的女性会告诉我一个项目什么时候能完成，当她们要请假时也会提前告诉我。如果她们在家工作，那么就算孩子生病也不用担惊受怕了。虽然当天她们可能没法像往常一样频繁地用Skype与我通话，但她们仍可以保持较高的工作效率，因为她们可以在家工作，同时可以照看生病的孩子。（像我一样，很多母亲为孩子请了保姆。即便是在家工作，没有人支持也是不行的，通常是由另一位女性提供照看服务。）母亲一般会努力工作以满足时间要求，因为她们有强烈的动机——她们想确保挤出时间给孩子做饭、接送孩子上下学，当然，还要保证自己的健身时间。

    不过我也知道，还有很多人怀有和28岁时的我一样的想法。他们低估了母亲的贡献，因为他们只计算你坐在办公室里的时间，而忽略了你的实际工作。如果所有人都把办公室时间当成生产力指标，大多数母亲在职场上都要失败。

    现在是时候打破这个怪圈了，尤其是要从各家公司的招聘官开始。我在20多岁时的做法是需要被否定的。如果当时我不接受、不认可团队里的母亲，后来也就不必担心我的未来会是什么样子。我交往过的许多负责招聘工作的年轻女性也有相同的行为，尤其是在科技领域。她们都是强硬派，也是激情的说教者，他们认为女性必须要待在办公室里，才能算是企业“文化”的一部分。

    但她们没有意识到，这种“文化”是如何将女性挤出职场的，因为这种文化是围绕男性的社交方式建立的。许多这些年轻女性都对这种文化惟命是从，我不羡慕她们，只是为她们感到遗憾。

    她们正在伤害未来的自己，就像当年的我一样。

    这些女性如果能够结成联盟，而不是互相否定，她们就能为未来的自己铺平道路。所以如果你的团队里有一名母亲的话，不要只是笑笑，说真遗憾你不能参加同事的酒局，不妨问问她能不能参加午餐聚会。如果你听见有人诽谤一名母亲，说她没有在办公室里待到下午7点，不妨指出她早上8点就来上班了，或者指出公司通过Skype或Slack也能在下午7点联系到她。

    作为女性，我们有很多方法可以相互支持，首先要意识到，我们每个人只不过都处于人生的不同位置和不同时段。

    有一件事再清楚不过：大多数女性迟早是要当妈妈的。根据美国人口普查局的统计，44岁以前，超过80%的女性都会成为母亲。所以勇敢拥抱你的未来，并且在工作中支撑你的未来吧！

    现在我知道了我是一个什么样的人。我是一个能够在家中或出差路上管理一个大型团队的母亲，一个能赚钱的女性，一个能够构建一个让女性获得成功的职场文化的人。我的工作效率超过以往任何时候，而且对我与女儿的未来从未像现在这样满足和兴奋。我希望很多年前自己就能意识到这一点。

    因此，我对所有曾和我共事过的母亲感到抱歉。这又让我想起了我在时代公司遇到的那位总编，她的名字叫凯茜，有三个孩子。由于一系列原因，那次合作最终未能达成。但六个月前，我们又开始说话了。凯茜最近加盟了PowerToFly，成为我们的执行编辑。她教了我很多如何提高工作效率的经验。现在我期待有更多像凯茜一样的人加盟PowerToFly，因为我知道她们能够管理好家庭、各种事务，以及非常高的事业目标。（财富中文网）

    本文作者Katharine Zakeski是PowerToFly公司的联合创始人兼总裁，该公司是首个将女性与科技及数码领域的高技术职位进行匹配的全球性平台，而且女性可以选择全职或在家工作。

    译者：朴成奎

    审校：任文科

    With the help of an awesome team that’s 50% moms from around the world, Milena and I are building PowerToFly around our lives as mothers. We’ve processed over a million dollars in paychecks for women who work from home across five continents and that number is growing fast. The stories we hear are thrilling.

    Before we found Nedda, our CTO, she was commuting to London from her home in Bulgaria every week. Nedda’s daughter would hide in her suitcase on Sunday nights in an attempt to be with her mother during the week. Now she gets picked up from kindergarten by her mom everyday. Nedda traded a very expensive ten-hour weekly commute (not including time on the London tube) for a thirty-minute walk with her child each afternoon.

    I wish I had known five years ago, as a young, childless manager, that mothers are the people you need on your team. There’s a saying that “if you want something done then ask a busy person to do it.” That’s exactly why I like working with mothers now.

    Moms tell me when a project can be done and they give me very advanced notice when they have to take time off work. If they work from home, it doesn’t matter if a kid gets sick. Yes, they might not be able to Skype with me as often through that day, but they can still be productive because they can work from home while keeping an eye on their child. (And, like me, many have childcare. There’s no way you can work from home without support, usually from another woman.) Moms work hard to meet deadlines because they have a powerful motivation – they want to be sure they can make dinner, pick a child up from school, and yes, get to the gym for themselves.

    But, I know there are still a lot of people like my 28-year-old self – they undervalue mothers’ contributions because they count hours logged in the office and not actual work. Most mothers lose if that’s the barometer for productivity.

    It’s time to break that cycle, and it starts with the people doing the hiring. The way I acted in my twenties had a lot to do with denial. If I didn’t embrace or recognize the mothers on my team, then I didn’t have to think about what my future would be like. I see the same behavior in young women I talk to who are in charge of hiring, especially in the tech space. They are hard liners – and passionate lecturers – about women being in the office so they can be part of the company’s “culture”.

    They don’t realize how that “culture” pushes women out because it’s too often set up around how men bond. Many of these young women are just toe-ing the company line. I don’t begrudge them. I feel sorry for them.

    They’re hurting their future selves. Just like I did.

    These women can help pave the path for their future selves if they start acting like allies rather than deniers. Instead of just smiling and saying you’re sorry that a mom can’t join for office drinks, ask her if she’d rather do lunch. If there’s a comment you over hear that disparages a mother because she wasn’t at her desk at 7pm, then speak up and point out that she was there at 8:30am, or completely available on Skype of Slack at 7pm.

    There are so many ways we can support each other as women, but it starts with the just recognizing that we’re all in different positions at different times in our lives.

    One thing is clear. Motherhood is the future for most women. Over 80% of us will become mothers by the age of 44, according to the US Census Bureau. So embrace your future and support it at work!

    Now I know who I am. I’m mother who can manage a large team from my home office or on a business trip, raise money, and build a culture for women to succeed. I’ve never been more productive, satisfied and excited about my future and my daughter’s. I wish I had recognized this years ago.

    For that, I’m sorry to all the mothers I used to work with. Which brings me back to that managing editor I dissed at Time. Her name is Cathy and she has three kids. The deal never went through for a variety of reasons that included editorial fit, but we started talking six months ago. Cathy recently joined PowerToFly as our Executive Editor. She has taught me a lot about how to be more productive than I was before motherhood. I’m now looking for more Cathys to join PowerToFly because I know they can manage households, multiple schedules and very high business goals.

    Katharine Zaleski is the Cofounder and President ofPowerToFly, the first global platform matching women in highly skilled positions across tech and digital that they can do from home, or in an office, if they choose.